This invention relates to an improved value printing device such as an electric postage meter or register, which has incorporated into it a novel disposable, self-contained cartridge for inking the printing characters of the device, and to the improved inking cartridge itself.
Value printing devices such as labeling apparatus, postage meters and registers, and the like, print information onto a surface by contacting the surface with print characters which are inked typically just prior to the print event. In a postage meter, for example, relative movement occurs between the print characters and inking roller which contains its own supply of ink, which contacts and thus inks the characters. Generally the print characters are raised against the background of the printing head. While the various inventive aspects which follow will be described in connection with commercially available electric postage meters, it will be understood that they apply to any printing device with like characteristics.
In rotary-head postage meters and registers, such as Pitney Bowes' models 5300, 6300 and 6500 meters, the print characters are contained on a rotary printing head which revolves relative to a stationary inking roller during the print cycle.
When the raised print characters encounter the inking roller, they make contact and are thus inked. In so called flat-bed postage meters, such as a Pitney-Bowes' model 5700 series meters the print characters are contained on a horizontal, flat printing head. The mailpiece to be marked is moved rapidly up against the printing head with enough force to be marked. In the print cycle, the inking roller and its support carriage are moved across the print characters just before printing, the characters remaining stationary. After printing and mailpiece removal, the roller moves back across the printing head to its original rest position. The invention to be described can apply to both rotary and flat-bed postage meters and registers, but will be described specifically with regard to a flat-bed model 5700 series meter, a meter available commercially for many years.
Various aspects of this type of postage meter have been described in the U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,069,084; 3,244,096; 3,310,139; and 3,143,963. The latter patent relates to means for limiting the number of cycles of a postage meter in accordance of the capacity of the inking roller and thereafter rendering the ink roller unfit for use in the postage meter.
Currently, in the example of the Pitney Bowes' model 5700 series meter, an ink roller is replaced when, in the operator's judgment, the impressions produced by the meter grow faint or weak. A hand tool specially designed for the purpose is used to grip the ends of the ink roller and remove it from the movable carriage supporting it in the device. The hand tool is necessary to avoid manual removal of the ink roller, which would surely result in inking or staining of the operator's hands or clothing. Frequently however, the hand tool is misplaced or difficult to find. Without it the cartridge can only be removed manually with the above described inconvenience.